Seem to be falling off my DIET! : (

Christmas of 2006 I started a diet. My weight was 370+ by Sept I was down to 277! I cut all junk food out and NO MORE regular soda! Cut my calories down to 1500 a day. The weight fell off. Now I seem to be falling off the track. I have put on about 30 lbs. I dont really watch what I eat, like before. I just dont ever want to go back to the old me!

you were doing so well, why do you think that your motivation isn't as strong as it was? Don't feel too disheartened you did it before so you can do it again, just need to try and get the old 'I can do this back'

Junk food is a problem for a lot of us including me.  Find out what it is you really enjoy and see if you can get a lower cal/fat version for the weekends only.  But it will need to fit in your calorie guideline of course.  Dieting has to be backed by motivation, so you won't be able to start until then.  Maybe you should have a short term realistic goal, such as losing those 30 lbs by this summer.  And then losing 30 more by the holiday season.  That will put you around 240. I wish you all the best.

I've been thinking about you and what came to mind is the calories you dropped to 1500! I'm guessing that at your original weight you would have been eating a lot more than that in a normal day, so to drop to that would have been quite a shock to your system, which could have contributed to you falling back into your old ways. If you work out on here your daily intake as it stands at the moment and then reduce it by no more than between 500-600 calories a day the weight loss will be slower but more likely to stay off, and as mtevensboyd said allow yourself treats (low cal/fat) at the weekend but also watch your sodium intake it should be quote; less than 2,400mg per day. Your motivation is  "I just don't want to go back to the old me!" You can do this remember how good you felt the first time, you just need to find the right balance that works for you.  

You don't have as far to go, so when you muster the determination to get yourself back on track, you should try a less extreme calorie amount, like about 2000.  Then when you finally do get to the weight you want to be, you need to keep in mind that THAT is when the battle truly begins, because you CANNOT SUCCEED if you keep thinking that you're "on a diet".  Diets are temporary.  When you hit your goal weight, you need to continue to monitor what you eat and up your intake gradually to a maintenance intake, and then stick to eating that amount PERMANENTLY.  Let's say your maintenance calorie intake is 2500 cal. per day.  You can eat 3000 one day and and 2000 the next and so on, so long as that weekly average daily calorie intake is 2500, you'll be fine.

 

But having the mentality that "I'm on a diet", is like telling yourself "Okay, I'm going to torture myself by not eating enough until I reach X goal, and after that, everything will be great and I can go back to eating the way that made me feel so good before" - That is a surefire setup for rebound gain.

If you want it to work, you can't think of it like as something with an end to it.  You were seriously overweight or obese like I was - that is a THREAT TO YOUR LIFE, and as you know, it also really lowers your quality of life, so you don't want to be on a diet, you want to make a permanent change in the way you take care of your body SO THAT YOU CAN SURVIVE.  So that you can live a normal or better lifespan, and spend most of it with good mobility and feeling good, not huffing and puffing just to walk and having ankle pain and GERD and god-knows-what and eventually bedridden.

At least that's what motivates me.  I don't want my weight to ever damage my quality of life or threaten my health again.  I have a finite number of years left on this earth, and I don't want to spend them being a lethargic prisoner of my own body, addicted to junk food and the feeling of being overly full.